I came into the new media — and social media — worlds after years in the trenches at print newspapers around the country. One mystery I could never resolve in my head was how print newspapers, even in their heyday, could never sell many ads for the sports section. Sales people always claimed that advertisers shied away from sports because they wanted to reach women, and they said women didn’t read sports sections.

I never totally bought that argument. Newspaper sales staffs could have been more creative in educating advertisers on how to attract women and not just settle for male sports readers wanting a tire sale. And sports news staffs were too drenched in testosterone to recognize that a large number of those filling the stands are women and many can read a box score.

But that was yesteryear and the media landscape has changed. Newspapers now struggle to keep readers of any gender — and advertisers — in the advancing digital age. However, the advertising truism still exists — in sales, women are still the coveted audience

Where are businesses looking for female customers going to find them these days? Social media, of course. A new study by the IT firm Royal Pingdom finds that 84% of the 19 social networking sites have more female than male users (53% females, 47% male). If Digg, Reddit and Slashdot were removed from the study, ALL 16 major social sites would have a majority of female users on them. Even LinkedIn, which has reportedly been the only site with a larger male audience, now is more predominantly female, according to the study.

This finding follows on another study last year by online research firm Rapleaf which found that women have more friends in social networks than men.

The newest study provides yet more evidence of how social media can help meet business goals. Most of your customers are using social media. They increasingly expect to be interacting with businesses while on their favorite social sites. If your business strategy especially targets women and you’re not interacting with them through social media, then hopefully this study will serve as a wake-up call.

You can thank me later.